JFK, the Cuba Missile Crisis and a Florida bunker at Peanut Island

Peanut Island at left, background; Palm Beach
across lagoon. Boat rental c. 1938 in Riviera Beach
Florida State Archives

Peanut Island

6500 Peanut Island Road

Riviera Beach, FL

561-845-4445

http://www.pbcgov.com/parks/peanutisland/

Sail Fish Marina (Palm Beach Shores) tours and shuttle service

https://www.sailfishmarina.com/water-taxi/

By Jane Feehan

Today a county park, Peanut Island literally rose from a 1918 Port of Palm Beach dredging project. The mission was to create Lake Worth Inlet, a shipping channel.  Discarded materials from Lake Worth formed a 10-acre “island” or spoil site.  Ownership and use of the island has been the subject of controversy over the years. The name was attached when Florida gave permission to use the site as a terminal for shipping peanut oil. The plan was abandoned in the 1940s but the name remained.

Of humble beginnings, Peanut Island boasts some lofty history.

The US Coast Guard opened a station on the island in 1936. President John F. Kennedy anchored his yacht,  Honey Fitz, at the station when he visited nearby Palm Beach.  During the 1961 Cuban Missile Crisis, US Navy Seabees built a small bunker on Peanut Island to be used as the nation's command center if the crisis forced Kennedy and his family to seek shelter while visiting the "Winter White House."  After the president was assassinated, some officials suggested renaming the island to honor Kennedy. The motion failed.

JFK delivering ultimatum to USSR
Florida State Archives/

Additional dredging expanded the island to 80 acres during the 1990s. Today, boaters dock at Peanut Island to picnic, take tours of the Palm Beach Maritime Museum (the old Coast Guard station) or to hike. Terms of the lease set by the Port of Palm Beach reserve the right to use the island for inlet and port maintenance and to deposit additional dredged materials.

Shuttle service (for a fee) to the island is offered at Sailfish Marina, 561-683-8294. For county park information, call 561-845-4445.  

Sources:

Palm Beach Post, Dec. 9, 1963.

Palm Beach County History Online at: https://pbchistory.org/

http://www.pbcgov.com/parks/peanutisland/

Tags: Palm Beach County history, Palm Beach County parks, Sailfish Marina, history of Florida, JFK, Peanut Island, Cuba Missile crisis

Cuba Missile Crisis - JFK response and Florida

 

JFK (right) delivering ultimatum to USSR  10/22/62
Florida State Archives/Florida Memory

By Jane Feehan

The extent of U.S. military buildup in response to the Cuba Missile Crisis (Oct. 16-28, 1962) wasn’t revealed to the world until President John F. Kennedy paid a personal call to the forward area set up in Florida and still in place a month later.

Kennedy visited Homestead Air Force Base Nov. 26 where a war room had been established to coordinate military operations. There, the Tactical Air Command (TAC) made available to the press an account of its response.

Nike-Hercules supersonic ground-to-air missiles were placed in South Dade farmlands. They could hurl atomic warheads 100 miles to counter Russian IL-28 bombers, called “Beagles.” Beagles had a range of 1,100-1,200 miles but only if deployed on a suicide mission. Otherwise, they couldn’t shoot more than a range of 500 miles.

One thousand fast-flying jet fighters and other planes were deployed to Homestead, Boca Chica Naval Air Station in Key West and other areas in the Southeast. TAC revealed that its planes flew combat air patrols as cover for daily reconnaissance missions over Cuban waters. The F-104s and
F-8Us, which could fly 1,000 mph, were ready to deploy if the missions encountered trouble.

Hundreds of Navy planes aboard eight carriers assisted in the blockade or “quarantine” of Castro’s island stronghold. Kennedy flew into Key West and drove past the ships to pay his respects after his stop at the Homestead base.

Seven thousand troops were deployed and still arriving in Florida during early November. They were quartered in ball parks, race tracks, and motels from Fort Lauderdale to Key West. Though the blockade officially ended Nov. 20, 1962, American weapons were not deactivated until September, 1963.

To mark the 50-year anniversary of the crisis, a neutralized 41-foot Nike Hercules missile was placed at the Nike Missile Base in Everglades National Park in 2012. The missile was delivered on the back of a flatbed truck that traveled down I-95 to George T. Baker Aviation School in Miami. There, students refurbished the Cuba Missile Crisis relic for display.

The Nike Hercules missile site was listed on the United States Department of the Interior Register of Historic Places on July 27, 2004 as a Historic District.

Nike Hercules Missile - photo from
Redstone Arsenal Historical Info.

Copyright © 2013 , 2021 All rights reserved. Jane Feehan.

Sources:

Miami News, Nov. 11, 1962

Miami News, Nov. 26, 1962

Sun-Sentinel, Aug. 21, 2012

Tags: Cuba Missile Crisis, military buildup in Florida during missile crisis, 50 year anniversary of Cuba Missile Crisis, Nike Hercules missiles in Florida, IL-28 Beagles, film industry researcher

Florida welcomes S&H Green Stamps 1961

Indiana Messenger Oct. 26, 1910

By Jane Feehan

The stuff of mid-20th century American shopping, S&H Green Stamps entered the South Florida market during May 1961 when Sperry Hutchinson inked deals with W.T. Grant’s, Winn Dixie, and Publix. South Florida was the final U.S. market the company penetrated. Redemption centers opened in the Fort Lauderdale/ Miami area in July that year.

Sperry Hutchinson began distributing stamps in 1896. The stamps, in denominations of one, ten and fifty points, were bonuses to shoppers based on dollars spent. Shoppers could redeem books of 1200 points for merchandise at redemption centers. Green stamps reached the zenith of their popularity in the 1960s. Recessions and competitors diminished the company’s market share of shopping bonus programs by the 1970s.

Tallahassee into
 S&H Green Stamps 1966
Florida State Archives

S&H filed for bankruptcy in 1996. In 2000, the company merged with Xinetix, Inc., a Fort Lauderdale operator of supermarket loyalty programs.  S&H launched the Greenpoints program (Greenpoints.com), a shopping bonus program for online purchases, in 2001.

____________

Sources:

Miami News, May 15, 1961

Information Week, March 18, 2002: 

SHSolutions.com

Wikipedia

Tags: Fort Lauderdale history, Florida in the 1960s, Miami in the 1960s, film researcher

Year of the Coconut - Florida in the 1960s

From a 1929 postcard
Courtesy of  State Archives of  Florida,
Florida Memory

Posted by Jane Feehan 

Coconuts played a part in promoting Florida tourism during the early 1960s. They were touted by the Miami News (Feb. 23, 1964) as “Miami’s Nuttiest Tourist Bait.”

It began in 1962 when 3,000 coconuts were distributed at the Seattle World’s Fair bearing labels urging “Follow me to Miami.” This public relations tactic made it to the front page of the Seattle Post Intelligencer.

The initiative, claimed by Miami City Manager Melvin L. Reese to be “an inexpensive way to extend the compliments of the city … and enhance the tropical image of Miami,” continued at different venues.

Two thousand were given away at New York’s Yankee Stadium during the Gotham Bowl Game December, 1962. Another 2,250 were distributed at the Florida Showcase in New York. Six hundred SS Hanseatic passengers, many of them Danes arriving at Fort Lauderdale’s Port Everglades, received coconuts as they disembarked. The Singing Mailmen of Miami gave them away on a trip up the Eastern Seaboard, resulting in one school dedicating a day of science class to the study of the palm tree and its fruit. A Rotary Club gave coconuts away to members winning club contests and more than 200 were presented to travel editors in 1962.

Miami tourism expanded in the 1960s; no doubt the coconut played a part in its growth. Perhaps 1962 may best be remembered by some South Floridians as the Year of the Coconut.

Tags: Florida tourism, Miami tourism, coconuts, tourism campaigns, history of Miami, history of South Florida, Miami in the 1960s, South Florida in the 1960s, coconuts in Florida

Disaster at sea: dozens perish in SS Yarmouth Castle fire 1965

* Photo in public domain

By Jane Feehan

Eighty seven people, including 27 members of a Pompano Beach senior center, went down with the SS Yarmouth Castle November 13, 1965 after it caught fire 60 miles from Nassau. Three others died from burns days later. The disaster, which claimed local and national headlines, resulted in tighter marine safety laws.

The aftermath of the tragedy, like so many others, revealed what could have, should have happened but did not.  There were 376 passengers and 176 crewmen aboard the ship that left Miami the day before. It caught fire so fast that a distress call could not be sent. Only four of the 12 or 13 lifeboats could be launched, sprinklers did not activate, fire doors did not close and an alarm did not sound. 

The ship went down in five hours. Survivors were picked up by the nearby Finnpulp and Bahama Star. Among those on the first half-filled lifeboat to reach the Finnpulp was the Yarmouth Castle’s 35-year-old Captain Byron Voutsinas; he was told to go back to his ship.

It was later detailed in a 27-page report that the fire started with mattresses set against a circuit board in a storage room where cans of paint sat. Excessive coats of paint throughout the ship contributed to the scope of the disaster, and so did the wooden superstructure that enabled rapid spread of flames. Fire hose pressure was insufficient.

The captain and several crew members were later cited for their actions – or non-actions. Of the 90 (some reports say 91) who perished, only two were crew members - a doctor and a female steward.

The report’s findings led to the creation of the Safety of Life at Sea Law (SOLAS) in 1966 that dictated a ship carrying more than 50 overnight passengers be constructed of a steel superstructure, that regular fire drills be conducted, and ample life saving equipment be available in cabins and inflatable life rafts provided on deck. (I sailed aboard the ship as a child and can vouch there was at least one fire drill on our cruise - before SOLAS was enacted.)

The 356-foot, 5002-ton ship was launched as the SS Evangeline in 1927, and operated by the Eastern Steamship Company in a route that included Boston, Yarmouth and Nova Scotia. During World War II, it was pressed into service as a transport ship in the Pacific theater. The Evangeline was sold to Chadade Steamship Company and renamed the Yarmouth Castle in 1964. By then, its home port was Miami as it cruised to Nassau, Jamaica and Haiti. 

The ship's history was peppered with a number of events before it burned and sank.  It was the first cruise ship to enter the Port of Miami after World War II. Later, on another trip, about 80 passengers came down with food poisoning. It again made headlines when it rescued and towed a ship to Government Cut, south of Miami. Another time, a Cuban stowaway was found when it was docked in Jamaica.

Two other burning ship disasters grabbed headlines in prior years. The Miami Herald mistakenly reported the Yarmouth as the the worst "sea disaster in the Western Hemisphere in the 32 years since the Morro Castle, also a cruise ship, burned off Asbury Park, NJ in 1934 ... when 134 lives were lost." In fact, the worst disaster before the Yarmouth was the burning of the Naronic in Toronto Harbor in 1949 when 139 people perished.

Copyright © 2012, 2020 All rights reserved. Jane Feehan.

*Use covered by the U.S. fair use laws because:

It is an image of a notable ship that was lost in 1965.

It is of much lower resolution than the original (copies made from it will be of very inferior quality)

The image is only being used for informational purposes.

Its inclusion in the article adds significantly to the article because it shows the subject of this article

Sources:

Miami News, Nov. 14, 1965

http://yarmouthshipping.com/id88.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarmouth_Castle_disaster

Tags: cruise ship disasters, SS Evangeline, SS Yarmouth Castle, Port of Miami history, maritime law, Florida sea disasters, film industry researcher, Florida history

Florida leads nation in population growth - 1960 - and about those food prices

Ocean World 1965
Florida State Archives/Florida Memory

The Census of 1960 indicated Florida led the nation with the biggest percentage* increase in population during the previous decade. The government counted 4,951,560 persons in the state, an upward change of 78.7 percent. The nation's population by 1960 reached 179,323,175 - an increase of 18.5 percent.

The census also revealed the following 1960 South Florida county statistics:

Broward population: 329,431
Dade population: 917,685
Palm Beach population: 224,537

The three counties made up 50 percent of the state's population growth rate.

Fort Lauderdale counted 81,806 residents in 1960. The population of the city in 2011 was estimated at 165,521; in 2018 177,000 and approaches 190,000 in 2021,

A look at 1960 grocery ads from A&P and Publix markets will generate nostalgia if population stats do not.

Beef ribs - 65 cents a pound
Beef rib roast - 69 cents a pound
Chicken fryer, leg or breast - 29-39 cents a pound
Morton's chicken pot pies - 5 for 99 cents
Eggs - 45 cents a dozen
Bananas - three pounds for 25 cents
Kraft Velveeta Cheese - 2 pound loaf - 85 cents
Bacon - one pound - 49 cents

* California led the nation in the largest numerical gain.

_____

Sources:
Miami News, Nov. 15, 1960
Ocala Star Banner, June 7, 1960
Palm Beach Post, June 1, 1960


Tags: 1960 Census, Florida Population 1960, Broward population 1960, Palm Beach County population 1960, Dade County population 1960, Fort Lauderdale population 1960, food prices 1960, film researcher

Mandatory Americanism vs. Communism classes in Florida after Castro takes office

 1962 -Superintendant of Public Instruction Thomas Bailey
examining a book on Communism.
Florida State Archives/Florida Memory

By Jane Feehan

With a wary eye cast south to Fidel Castro’s communist encampment in Cuba, Florida’s state legislature passed a law in 1961 that made it mandatory for public schools to teach an anti-communist course. The course, “Americanism versus Communism,” was taught to high school seniors beginning in 1962.

Florida law stated:

The course shall lay particular emphasis upon the dangers of communism, the ways to fight communism, the evils of communism, the fallacies of communism, and the false doctrines of communism.

Also:

The course … shall emphasize the free enterprise – competitive economy of the United States of America as the one which produces higher wages, higher standards of living, greater personal freedom and liberty than any other system of the economies on earth.

Castro (right) with fellow revolutionary 
Camilo Cienfuegos entering
 Havana on January 8, 1959.
Photo courtesy of Luis Korda

A new course subject brought the usual questions about textbooks, but administrators were also concerned about who would serve as authoritative sources. They worked through the uncertainties and published a 62-page teacher’s guide that dictated the points to be covered as well as a list of 50 publications for outside reading.

Teachers didn’t protest but there was keen national interest in the law because never had a state legislature spelled out exactly what should be taught in schools. The 800-pound guerilla in teacher’s lounges was the possibility that governments could be just as explicit in the teaching of American history, economics and more.

We all survived. I remember taking the course in school via the Educational TV station broadcasting out of Miami. Florida repealed the law mandating the anti-communist course in 1983 and replaced it with a requirement for an economics class. Times have changed and fear has strangely evaporated about the state dictating school curriculum. 

Given today's hard left turn, perhaps it's time* to bring this class back or the highly useful class about how our government works, civics.

* Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill June 22, 2021 to introduce a similar course curriculum to Florida schools.

Copyright © 2020, 2021. 

Sources:

Miami News, Mar 18, 1962

Miami News, April 15, 1983

Tags: Florida history, Florida in the 1960s, Florida legislature 1960s, Castro and Florida, Florida schools in the 60s, film industry researcher

Florida's population explosion in the 1950s; Fort Lauderdale leads

Fort Lauderdale Beach circa 1960 
Florida State Archives/Erickson

By Jane Feehan

A special census was taken* in the mid-1950s in Florida. The trend upward from the official US Census of 1950 was remarkable.

Four cities in the state joined the over-50,000 population rankings with Fort Lauderdale leading the way with the biggest increase:

• Fort Lauderdale soared from the 1950 Census of 36,328 to 62,906 persons in the mid-50s.
• Miami Beach from 46,282 persons in 1950 to a mid-decade count of 50,981.
• West Palm Beach jumped to 51,015 from 43,162 persons in 1950.
• Pensacola among the four growth cities, tallied 50,954 mid-decade; 43,479 in 1950.

And ...

• Broward County nearly doubled its population in five years – from 83,933 in 1950 to 159,052 persons by the mid-1950s.
• Dade County also climbed significantly from 495,084 to 703,777 in about five years

By 1960, the population increases in Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties accounted for approximately 50 percent of the entire state’s growth.

In 2021, Fort Lauderdale's population was reported at about 182,000 residents. No doubt, 2022 will reflect another substantial increase due to different reasons from those of the 1950s: rising crime and higher taxes in other states.

 ---------------

*Locally-financed special counts were taken to qualify for additional revenues.

For more information on population, see: index for Florida in the 1950s

Sources:

Miami News, Oct. 11, 1957

Palm Beach Post, Nov. 19, 1961

Tags: Fort Lauderdale history, Fort Lauderdale population in the 1950s, South Florida population growth in the 1950s, film researcher, history of Fort Lauderdale